A few days after the party, Billy went to check the prisons of the state. Their numbers were small, and the number of prisoners was pitiful, but that was a good thing, right? Not for Billy's current purposes. In any case, it was only natural that fewer criminals would exist since monsters and dungeons were more troublesome.
"What are their crimes?" Billy asked.
"Stealing from merchants that work for rich families," the jailer replied. "Murderers usually receive bounties for their heads, and adventurers target them, and since that is basically a death sentence, few of them are crazy enough to go that far."
In any case, it seemed that the state still had some criminals roaming free, those who targeted the less rich merchants probably didn't have to worry about pursuers, so their life wasn't troublesome. In any case, the jailer received the order that Billy would take the prisoners away, and while they glared at him at first, they soon grew quiet after looking him in the eye.
Each of the prisons had ten of those guys, so Billy got thirty underlings in the blink of an eye. He had bought a big office where he stored most of his pills, and that place had enough rooms and beds for them.
Using his powers, Billy convinced them to work for him and also convinced them to forget their criminal record. Unless he uses some extra mana, he couldn't get their Absolute loyalty. Still, since he was going to pay them well, Billy didn't have to turn them into zombies. That would make them look suspicious in some aspects, after all.
While making them produce some pills for him, Billy also told them their jobs. They had to sell the pills in other states while they gathered Intel for him. The carriages that he made for them were sturdier and faster, so they would be able to move two times faster than ordinary merchants. For the time being, they will have to return with the Intel since Billy didn't solve the problem of sending instantaneous messages yet. All the ideas that he had needed his intervention, and that wouldn't work since they would work alone.
After training them for one month, Billy began to send them to move and sell the pills in the state. Billy had connected the capital with most cities and towns, so gathering information there was easy. However, Billy had other goals. By making his merchants travel alone, they became targets of some bandits that targeted newbies. To capture them alive, he gave the merchants some crossbows that could tire Earth arrows without the tip, so they were knocked down easily, and Billy gained more bandits to work with.
"Those people that you recruited… They look really weird," Kate said one day when Billy returned from his company.
"How so?" Billy asked.
"They look too happy even though they work for you and everyone knows that you are most of the time a pain in the ass," Kate said.
"What was that supposed to mean… Are you bored and lonely because you aren't working and I am busy most of the day now?" Billy asked.
"Not a chance," Kate replied. "Putting the jokes aside, they still look kind of weird "
"Don't worry about it," Billy said. "They are completely harmless since I trained them pretty harshly. In any case, you are getting a bit bigger with the physical training that you added to your routine. Try not to neglect your strengths in order to improve your weaknesses."
The other day, Sarah learned lightning magic, and that made Kate feel like she was falling behind. She was the second pure mage of the group, after all. Even Lily was starting to make her arrows emit some sparks as she tried to make them fly faster, so that motivated Kate to train a bit more.
As for Natalie, she was perfecting her Durandal. That was the name of her beam of energy, similar to Billy's Gungnir. It was weird that those skills that those names, but Billy assumed that it was because the previous users of the system created those skills and named them like that.
According to the legends, Durandal was a sword used by a famous warrior called Roland. After a failed invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, Roland held the rear, allowing the Frankish forces to retreat through the pass. Roland was equipped with Durendal, a blade infused with — according to The Song of Roland — several sacred Christian relics: a tooth of Saint Peter, a tassel from the shroud of Mary, and the hair of Saint-Denis. This legendary sword was said to have the power to cut through solid rock. It was quite the legends… just like Gugnir.
According to the legends, the Gungnir spear, when thrown, never misses the mark and always returns to Odin's hand. Furthermore, oaths sworn in Gungnir's name are unbreakable. It was also with her that the god spent nine days and nine nights in Yggdrasill, the world tree, and soon after obtained knowledge about the runes. Billy didn't obtain that knowledge, though.
"I already know that, but I don't have many ideas as of late of how to improve my skills, just meditating is too boring," Kate said.
"Don't say things like that when you are a twenty-seven years old mother," Billy said and then sighed. "Still, I get what you mean, it is hard to come up with special attacks when it comes to magic."
"Special attacks? I don't really get what you mean," Kate said.
"Don't mind the small stuff, in any case, keep trying to improve your control and senses over mana and you will eventually get something," Billy said. "Something like this."
Billy said and then took a step forward, but he ended up crossing the entire garden in a single moment. Using mana on his legs, he could strengthen them and decrease the Resistance of the ambient over him. Thus making him cross longer distances instantly. However, the skill wasn't perfect yet. The system didn't even recognize it.
